EvE Matchmaking Explanation

A lot of players have been asking for some clarity behind how we conduct matchmaking for EvE so we wanted to be transparent about our matchmaking algorithm and what it takes into account:

EvE Matchmaking Goals:

• Promote competition at all levels of play, while still allowing players to face a variety of different opponents
• Have leaderboards more accurately reflect an empire’s level of strength
• Reward winning, penalize losing and inactivity
• Reduce match ups against inactive empires

Power Index and Leaderboards:

• A power index is calculated for each empire and is updated after every battle, and leaderboards are ordered using the power index. As an example, the number one empire in Legend League will have the highest power index, and the final empire in Bronze League will have the lowest power index.

• The calculation for power index takes into account each empire’s previous 50 battles and more recent activity has a greater weighting. If the winning empire had a lower power index at the start of the battle, more points may be awarded to the winning empire.

Matchmaking:

• Within each League, empires are divided into “pools” of similar power index. Empires are most likely to fight other Empires of similar power index/leaderboard position within their own pool, but can be matched against Empires in other pools. The farther away two Empire’s pools are, the less likely they are to fight one another.

• Sometimes there are an odd number of Empires to be matched within a given League. In this event, the ‘odd’ empire will be matched with an Empire in the League directly below (i.e. Empire at the bottom of Legend will be matched with an Empire at the top of Diamond)

Re: EvE Matchmaking Explanation

Thank you for the clarification tank.

Nice to see I pretty got the ranking factors right in the other threads lol. Specifically the aspect on recent battles weighing heavier than past ones.

Again thank you for explaining, pretty much answered any possible ranking question. It won't satisfy some people but it's good enough for me. The matchmaking is still questionable to me but I still maintain the ranking system wasn't the issue. Transparency is always a good thing imo

Re: EvE Matchmaking Explanation

A lot of players have been asking for some clarity behind how we conduct matchmaking for EvE so we wanted to be transparent about our matchmaking algorithm and what it takes into account:

EvE Matchmaking Goals:

• Promote competition at all levels of play, while still allowing players to face a variety of different opponents
• Have leaderboards more accurately reflect an empire’s level of strength
• Reward winning, penalize losing and inactivity
• Reduce match ups against inactive empires

Power Index and Leaderboards:

• A power index is calculated for each empire and is updated after every battle, and leaderboards are ordered using the power index. As an example, the number one empire in Legend League will have the highest power index, and the final empire in Bronze League will have the lowest power index.

• The calculation for power index takes into account each empire’s previous 50 battles and more recent activity has a greater weighting. If the winning empire had a lower power index at the start of the battle, more points may be awarded to the winning empire.

Matchmaking:

• Within each League, empires are divided into “pools” of similar power index. Empires are most likely to fight other Empires of similar power index/leaderboard position within their own pool, but can be matched against Empires in other pools. The farther away two Empire’s pools are, the less likely they are to fight one another.

• Sometimes there are an odd number of Empires to be matched within a given League. In this event, the ‘odd’ empire will be matched with an Empire in the League directly below (i.e. Empire at the bottom of Legend will be matched with an Empire at the top of Diamond)

Thank you tank. I highly encourage you to look at your matchmaking more closely as well. Perhaps you should separate out the top 10 pool of power index and every day have the teams in the top 10 face one other team in the top 10. So if you are top 10, you know you are going to get a top 10 fight at least once per day.

Originally Posted by Chris Michaels

Thank you for the clarification tank.

Nice to see I pretty got the ranking factors right in the other threads lol. Specifically the aspect on recent battles weighing heavier than past ones.

Again thank you for explaining, pretty much answered any possible ranking question. It won't satisfy some people but it's good enough for me. The matchmaking is still questionable to me but I still maintain the ranking system wasn't the issue. Transparency is always a good thing imo

Re: EvE Matchmaking Explanation

Thanks a lot for the explanation Tank!
Now we know what to look at and how to look at the numbers! So it s all luck basically cause if you are number 4, but you never meet number 1,2,3 during your last 50 matches, and number 1,2,3 dont meet each other and win, then you cant progress. Now it all makes sense
Appreciated.

PS: if you could make the number of empires per pools smaller, we would have more competition. Or send us playoffs

Re: EvE Matchmaking Explanation

Great explanation! Here's a tip to better the system: Form an Eve Playoff Committee to arbitrarily make up the top 25 rankings. The top undefeated empire should probably be left at #4, leaving 1 loss empires in the top 3 slots. After all, winning isn't everything.

Re: EvE Matchmaking Explanation

I like this New UWE_Tank. He is open honest gives us clear information. When a mistake is made, he admits it and does something to correct it. New stuff is coming out, improvements are being made. Kind of like the old days, keep it up.

Re: EvE Matchmaking Explanation

Thanks for the clarification. If I read it correctly, it sounds like only the last 50 battles of an entire session matter. Is that correct? What's the point of having the season, if you play all 4 battles a day, be 360 battles or so if only the last 50 count in the power index? Also, if the last 50 are all that matter, maybe you should shrink the size of the pools so you do not have a stretch where the 1st and 2nd place team do not play each other.

I could see Chosen reading this scoring and decide to play 4 battles a day the last 2 weeks of a season. They could leap them right up to 1st...

I still agree with Chris, a playoff would be sweet. Maybe do it for each pool, so all teams are part of a tournament/playoff if you will.

Re: EvE Matchmaking Explanation

It's very simple. Winns determind the rank... Like every sportsleague in the world. From battle to battle. Your rank system is not right or fair for that matter. How to matchup? Well simple. Let 1-50 battle eachother 51-100 etc. You have made a system that perhaps looks fair in a formular but def not in game.

Concider making it easy. Winning each round determinds the placement in battlerank. That way a team doesn't end up lower than empires they beat every time.

Re: EvE Matchmaking Explanation

I agree in theory the system should work, however, it creates mismatches in at least 1-2 wars daily.

Another problem with the system is the players. Players bounce from empire to empire too much. They help an empire win a couple weeks then move to the next one.

I don't have the answer for the correct system but the one in place isn't it.

I've started too many wars knowing that my 80 member empire was going to crush the empire across from us with no one above level 200 and only 50 members. While we have several above 1000 and a lot above 500.

They weren't wven able to get a single building even though we drug out the war.

Re: EvE Matchmaking Explanation

Re: EvE Matchmaking Explanation

What I find fascinating is how the system determines where your empire places at the end of a season. Ill use my empire and last season as a example: We are a very casual empire that war 4 times a day. The 4:00 am war is the "throw away" war. This keeps us out of Legend league as much as possible. That said, the last two days we went on a winning spree and placed #182 Legend 2014 Fall season. This blows my mind since when we do fall backwards into Legend those wars are normally a massacre. Like I said we are very casual and have a good little team of like minded individuals where work and school is top priority but some of the empires we placed ahead of last season makes absolutely no sense at all. If we are basically Platinum/Diamond for the whole majority of a entire season there should be no way we had the opportunity to "place" in Legend...even if we won all the games 2 days prior to the season ending.

I'm really not complaining here since it was a huge boost to our egos placing anywhere amongst the Legend empires but I like to understand in more depth as to how match making and season placement works. From what I can tell the last days of a season is really what determines your placement at the end of a season. Forget about your record or what empires you beat...which really doesn't set right with me but since this last season was in my favor I guess it will have to do. I'd like to think someday they make it to where there are certain empires you will never face due to level average, amount of members and overall record.

Re: EvE Matchmaking Explanation

Originally Posted by UWE_Tank

Power Index and Leaderboards:

• A power index is calculated for each empire and is updated after every battle, and leaderboards are ordered using the power index. As an example, the number one empire in Legend League will have the highest power index, and the final empire in Bronze League will have the lowest power index.

• The calculation for power index takes into account each empire’s previous 50 battles and more recent activity has a greater weighting. If the winning empire had a lower power index at the start of the battle, more points may be awarded to the winning empire.

Could you post the formula used to calculate the power index, and how wins/losses would affect it?

Re: EvE Matchmaking Explanation

Re: EvE Matchmaking Explanation

I don't think there can ever be an equal matching system based on the player diversity in spending... I'm fine with that and I can acknowledge that records don't mean that you faced the equal competition so .. Gl figuring out how to make it fair but not loose the currently active players.. If it was fair .. There wouldn't be small empires to rebound on because we'd all quit playing lol

That said .. I think what the game lacks is that the strategy an empire takes can never over take what another empire has spent in real money.. Sports all contain the element that at the start .. Either team can win right.. Upsets are exciting and possible